mass of Protestants, who have left us during the last ten years, removed with him an average of ten pounds in money and effects, which certainly is a moderate allowance, the total will amount to nearly two millions of money! This is certainly a tremendous deduction from the farming capital of a country so destitute of such capital as Ireland, and when we consider that this emigration is increasing; that it is even extending itself among persons of substantial means-we feel we have before us a prospect of the larger portion of the effective and at present employed farming capital of the country being, before many years more, removed altogether! Those who understand the state of Ireland and are aware of the mischiefs and multifold distresses arising even now from her want of capital available for employment in agricultural and farming in general, will, at once, see the magnitude of all this evil, arising out of the emigration of the small farming population of the country.

In the next place, we should remember that the feelings and wishes of the Protestant population are all on the side of England, and of property, and of law. They have never forgotten that they are the descendants of the original English and Scottish settlers, inheriting their names, their language, their habits, and their religion, and they are, therefore, in all their feelings and interest, attached to British connections; they are ever recognized as loyal to the crown, and obedient to the laws, so much so as to have their excessive loyalty often cast in their teeth as a crime, by their enemies; while every magistrate in the island is aware that they were the only individuals upon whom the civil powers could depend with confidence for assistance in the time of need. The country gentlemen too, can testify whether they were not the ever ready supporters of the due influence of rank and property, whenever assailed by priests and agitators. Truly they were a class of men, orderly, steady, industrious, loyal, and religious, who, as a body, had no superiors in their class in any nation in the world, and yet these are the very individuals who are emigrating in such numbers, leaving the interests of England and of pro

perty at the mercy of a populace untamed and uneducated, bigoted and inflammable, and fitted to be the willing tools and slaves of every knavish priest, and every factious agitator. We know of no more terrible event in reference to the connection of the two islands, than the threatened emigration of the Irish Protestants, and we can imagine nothing more likely to shake the whole settlement of property in this island, than the removal of that very population which has ever proved itself attached to all the interests of property; a population embracing, not the mere labouring and impoverished peasantry, whose exportation would be a blessing, but the thriving, the industrious, the respectable, the English-like farming and yeoman classes of the people, upon whose intelligence, loyalty and industry, much of the prosperity as well as safety of the country is dependent.

In our former article on this subject we entered on a detailed, though concise, history of the emigration of the Protestants from Ireland, and we, at the same time, touched upon the cause that led to such a melancholy result. We shall now again touch upon the latter particular, in order that the public may see clearly the circumstances which operate in promoting an evil of such paramount magnitude. We ascribe this hopeless evil to the unsettled and unhappy state of the country, arising from the radically defective system adopted by the landlords and the wholly unsuitable principles which have been acted on by the government.

I. THE LANDLORDS.-The great object of ambition with an Irish landlord, next to the enlargement of his rentroll, is the extension of his electioneering influence. Previous to the year 1793, when the measure for granting the elective franchise to the Catholics was carried, and thus broke the seal which had so long closed the fountain of Catholic claims and Catholic aggressions, this object of ambition was found actively ministering as a handmaid to the promotion of Protestantism throughout the length and breadth of the island, for, as in those precedent times, the elective franchise was strictly confined to the Protestants, so that it became the interest of all who were ambitious of electioneering influences,

to plant them on their estates, and to encourage them throughout the country, for thus the political power of the proprietor was in exact proportion to the numerical amount of his Protestant tenantry; under such circumstances the inducements held out to the settlements, and increase of Protestants of the lower orders were many and great, and though such a state of things ceased with the unfortunate measure of 1793, yet the leases which had previously been made, were still in existence; those leases were made in vast numbers to the Protestant tenantry, during the period that intervened between the passing of the Octennial Bill, in 1768, and the Franchise Bill, in 1793; they were, in general, for three young lives, and, in the natural course of things, those lives began to drop rapidly, and the leases consequently to fall in, from about the year 1820, to the present times; many of them still remain unexpired, but, by far the greater portion have already fallen in, and those which remain must follow in a very few years.

This circumstance, though natural and simple in itself, has more materially affected the Protestant population than an unobservant person would have supposed, and has prepared the way for much of the emigration of which we write. Those Protestant tenants finding their leases expired, and receiving no preference for a renewal of their leases, either as Protestants or as old tenants, and being unable to give the rents demanded, or rather to pay the rent which new applicants offer to a necessitous landlord, are obliged to surrender the lands which their families possessed for perhaps more than half a century, and being thus thrown on their own resources, are induced to turn their attention to America. Those tenants, too, whose leases have not as yet actually expired, but who anticipate only a few years more of possession, have begun to think that they will act most prudently for themselves and their families, by disposing of their leases while they have yet any remaining interest in them,-for, judging by the fate of others, they conclude that they also will be obliged to surrender their farms at the expiration of their leases. They thus dispose, at once, of all they

To

possess, and emigrate while they can raise the means of doing so on the remaining term of their leases. T these causes, then, is to be ascribed a large proportion of the emigration of the old Protestant tenantry during the last few years.

rent

It is not easy for those who are not conversant with the character and habits of our peasantry, to conceive why such circumstances should necessarily lead to the removal or the emigration of the Protestants any more than the Catholics, or why the former, any more than the latter, should be unable to take out a renewal of the lease on the terms of the landlord. This seeming difficulty, however, vanishes away with those who have observed the respective character and habits of our rustic population; for the Protestant and Catholic peasantry are beings of a different kind-animals of a totally different order; and the industrious and steady settler of America is not more different from the wild and restless Indian of its native forests, than are those two classes of the peasantry of Ireland. This difference is preserved, even in the taking of land, to such an extent, that there is universally understood to be what is called a Protestant price and a Popish price for land; the readily offered by the latter being greater than that ever offered by the former; so that a Catholic tenantry is far more lucrative than a Protestant tenantry to the landlord. This fact is now universally acknowledged, and has arisen from the habits of these respective classes. The Protestant requires decent clothing, good feeding, and a certain portion of education for his family. He cultivates cleanliness in his house and person, and displays an independence of mind and conduct in all things: all these matters require some expenditure; and when he proposes for a farm, he coolly calculates what tent he will be able to pay. Romanist, on the other hand, merely calculates whether he shall be able to make the rent; for as he is contented with the least and worst possible clothing and feeding, and is very easy as to the quality of education for his family, and is most philosophically careless about cleanliness, and everything that savours of external decency and com

The

fort, he is enabled to live on a much expenditure, and so, saving a larger profit out of the proceeds of the farm, can outbid the Protestant. As the increase of rent, thus offered, is a matter of much importance to our landlords generally, so it is to be expected that they will scarcely resist the temptation; and the competition for what they call "a bit of land" is so great, that the peasantry often outbid each other to an extent ruinous to themselves, though seemingly lucrative to the landlords. The result of this competition," as we stated in our former article on this subject, "is always the same, namely, the Romanist takes possession of the land, and the Protestant takes his passage to America!" Unhappily our landlords have learned to value a tenant, not according to his character for honesty or loyalty, nor according to his disposition to improve the land, nor according to the punctuality of his payments, but according to the amount which he adds to the rentroll. He may be a Whiteboy, or a Blackfoot, or a Whitefoot-he may be a Steelboy, or a Ribbonman-still, if he only offer the highest rent, he is declared the tenant; and, unfortunately, to make this matter worse in its effects, the landlords themselves pay little or no attention to the matter, but hand over the management of their tenantry to stewards and drivers, who being, in general, native Papists, steeped in all the prejudices, and implicated often in the designs of the ill-affected, take care that their companions in disaffection shall always possess the preference. It is

sad

and melancholy fact that, owing to this system, the whole face of the country is by degrees changing ownerspassing from the hands of the loyal, peaceful, and religious Protestant, who was a good tenant as well as a faithful subject, into the hands of the most active and wily of the partizans of those who are opposed to the interests of the landlords, as they are estranged from the supremacy of England.

A spirit of mawkish liberalism has been long affected by many of these landlords, to excuse their conduct towards their Protestant tenantry; and whenever we hear of a landlord professing liberalism, we at once proclaim him to be some necessitous and grind,

ing proprietor; because we have ever found that it was a mere pretence to excuse themselves in removing their Protestant tenants, and planting Romanists in their stead. They profess, indeed, to think that there should be no preference given to one over the other, and that both should be treated on precisely the same terms. This profession, indeed, might be forgiven by us, as an amiable weakness, notwithstanding the disastrous consequences that have flowed from it, in the expatriation of the Protestants, did we believe that such professions were sincere; but, knowing the country well, we denounce all such profession as foul and rank hypocrisy; and loathing, as we do, such treason to our common cause, we tear off the mask, and dash aside the veil that conceals the nakedness of all that grinding avidity for an increased rental, which is the true motive of their conduct. They prefer" the Popish price" to "the Protestant price" for their lands, and then, unblushingly, talk about the liberalism of their sentiments! In thus denouncing this system we have only followed a high authority, even that of Lord Clare, who in his place in the Irish House of Lords did not hesitate to express himself in these words:→→→

"The great misfortune of Ireland, and particularly of the lower class of its inhabitants is, that at the expiration of every lease the farm is put up to auction, and, without considering whether he is Protestant or Papist--whether he is industrious or indolent--whether he is solvent or a beggar-the highest bidder is declared the tenant by the law agent of the estate, I must say to the disgrace of the landlord, and most frequently much to his advantage. It happened to me, in 1793, to canvass the county in which I reside, and on an estate which had been newly set at £26,000 a year, I found but five Protestant tenants!"

Such was the opinion of one who had no superior in knowledge of the true evils of this country. Now the manner in which this ruinous and disgraceful system operates is this.. When the lease of the farm is expired, the landlord, or his agent, gives notice of his readiness to receive proposals; the old Protestant tenant offers a fair remunerating rent, in hopes of again

obtaining the farm which he has improved by good and careful husbandry, and he thinks himself, for that cause, entitled to a preference. The Roman Catholic then offers a much higher rent, and the landlord, affecting to be too liberal to consider the conduct, or the religion, or the loyalty of the parties-affecting to be too liberal to give a preference to any one, takes the farm from the Protestant and transfers it to the Catholic, merely because he offers a higher rent! Such, and none other, is the liberalism of Ireland! If, indeed, these landlords loved the peace of the country-if they sought respect for the laws-if they wished for loyalty to the crown-if they desired the safety of "the settlement" of property—if they wished for the maintenance of the legislative union-if these were the motives that had a fitting place in their breasts, they would fling from them this mask of hypocrisy, this affectation of liberalism, and encourage a tenantry respectful to the laws, loyal to the crown, and attached to the British connexion; they would cease, for the future, their yearly sacrifice of a whole hecatomb of Protestants at the shrine of their rent-roll.

Painful as is the contemplation of all this disastrous posture of affairs, it be comes tenfold more so when we reflect on the hopelessness of the case. Indeed that which naturally flings a gloomy shadow of despair over the state of the Protestants of the lower orders, is the fact-painful, yet certain as the creation-that the nature and extent of the evil is such as to admit now of no remedy. The case is desperate and hopeless, owing, on one hand, to the prodigious and exhausting length at which the stream of emigration has arrived, draining our Protestant population of the very best conducted and most thriving of their number; and, on the other hand, to the pecuniary difficulties and embarrassments of the landlords. Those difficulties and embarrassments press down upon the landed interest, and especially upon the proprietor himself, to such an extent, that he cannot cope with them; so that while they display the utter hopelessness of the state to which the inferior Protestants are reduced, they form the only apology for the conduct

of the landlords towards that class of their tenantry. The vast majority of our Irish estates are so deeply involved with annuities, mortgages, and other incumbrances, arising out of the extravagance of the past or present generation, that at least one half the entire rental goes annually to liquidate them; and even then, when their crippled circumstances should lead them to habits of economy and moderation, the passion for electioneering, or the desire to maintain the importance of the family name, only plunges them still deeper in their sea of difficulties, and compels them to set their estates at the highest possible value. The great and general depression also, under which the landed interest suffered since the war times, and especially that scourging measure to our landlords, by which they were made liable to pay off in gold those mortgages which they had raised in an inferior currency, all conspired to involve the great body of our proprietary to such a ruinous extent, as to force them to have recourse to every means by which they could hope to increase their incomes, so as to be able to meet the demands of their creditors. We know of one county, upon the rental of which there are mortgages to the amount of above rwO MILLIONS sterling! This consideration will account for the extreme avidity with which our proprietary grasp at every prospect of an increased rental, although they are thereby ruining the whole body of the poorer Protestants. Our Landlords are too much embarrassed to retain a PROTESTANT tenantry.

This melancholy and hopeless system has not only ruined the circumstances and prospects of the Protestants of the lower orders, but has also had a sad effect on their minds and affections. A change has long been coming over their spirits, a shadow has passed upon them, and they stand no longer in the same relative position towards the gentry of the country which they once occupied; an estrangement, growing wider and wider every day, is walking with the step of a giant among them, and so marked is this estrangement that in a few, a very few, years there will be no two classes of the population of this island so separated, so alien, so little identified in

tinterest and feeling, as the Protestant gentry and the Protestant peasantry. -Very different indeed was the genius of long vanished years; then these Protestants were imported into the island, they were planted on the estates, they were encouraged throughout the country, they were fostered and kindly treated everywhere; all this was done by our proprietary, in order to secure a tenantry on whom they could depend, and in whose strong right hands they could rely in the hour of civil strife, for they felt they could rest in peace and pillow their heads in confidence so long as they were surrounded by such faithful men; and they in return for all this confidence and encouragement, felt every feeling of their souls pledged to respond to it, and to prove themselves faithful to the proprietary; the chord was touched and it answered in perfect harmony. So powerfully did this feeling master the minds of the lower order of Protestants, that every fibre of their hearts was strained to prove them faithful, and they clung with a desperate fidelity to everything connected, directly or indirectly, with the interest of property. The world gives no stronger example of close and unwavering attachment than that of the lower order of Protestants to their landlords. But a change is fast working among them. A spirit has walked among them, and it muttered, as it passed, a word that whispers of neglect and ingratitude, of unkindness and wrong; it awakes the memory of their former state, when their highest pride and loftiest boast was their standing forth in defence of the landlord, and rallying around the standard of poverty, when they were openly recognized as the only champions of the life of one, and the only allies for the security of the other, and it points to the change-alas, how changed removing one by one, and day by day, from the green hills of their fathers, and the sunny fields of their youth, constrained to witness their homes transferred sometimes to the very individuals with whom they had struggled foot to foot, and hand to hand, in the strife and storm of the last rebellion, and now neglected and forgotten by those for whom they would have sacrificed their all, they are compelled to wander houseless and homeless among

those who laugh at their misfortunes, while they despise the landlords for their cupidity, and are at last compelled to seek for "happy homes and altars free" in the wide savannas or the howling forests of the American world. They cry with the psalmist of Israel, "It is not an open enemy that hath done me this dishonour, for then I could have borne it-neither was it mine adversary, for then peradventure I would have hid myself from himbut it was even thou, my companion, my guide, and mine own familiar friend! We took sweet counsel together and walked in the House of God as friends." Their troubles have indeed come, not from their avowed enemies, but from their professed friends, from those who knelt at the same altar and held the same faith and hope. Matters are, indeed, changed, and if the landed proprietors of Ireland are not awakened on their downy pillows by the burning and indignant malison of those whom they have so deeply injured as their Protestant tenantry, it is because their unhappy, yet generous victims, do even yet love, with a lingering feeling, the repositories of gentle blood, and look "more in sorrow than in anger" upon those who have so vitally and deeply wronged them.

II. THE GOVERNMENT.-We would greatly err if we ascribed all this spirit for emigration among the Protestants to the conduct of our proprietary, therefore it was that we already stated that such conduct was only one of the principal causes leading to that result; and we then added, that the second leading cause arose from the unsuitable principles upon which the government of this island has too long been conducted. In making this charge against the government, we would desire to be understood as not alluding particularly to the Tory or the Whig administrations, or to any other particular phase or form of government, but to the general system which has been pursued for above a century-a system that seems throughout to have been marked alike by virulence and weakness, by hostility and concession; so that with reference to it, it may justly be said, that Protestantism existed, not by it, but in despite of it, and the consequence of which has been a more wild,